


2. Favourite Place to Eat

by bohemianraspberries



Series: 30dayhqwriting [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: 30dayhqwriting, AU - Daichi and Suga meet in Paris, Fluff, M/M, honestly this is so cheesy i'm ashamed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-24
Updated: 2015-03-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 08:25:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3603189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bohemianraspberries/pseuds/bohemianraspberries
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Paris. Daichi is lost, Suga finds him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	2. Favourite Place to Eat

**Author's Note:**

> this is for day 2 of the 30dayhqwriting challenge on tumblr but it's only very loosely based on the prompt (date night/favourite place to eat). tbh i just had the idea and wanted to write it. i hope it's okay.

He had no idea what he was doing here, so far away from home, alone and scared and too proud to admit that he’d been wrong about himself – about everything. Too proud to allow himself to even think about leaving. Just the idea of returning home, shame-faced, and begging a second chance sent waves of anxiety through his stomach and flooded his cheeks with the heat of humiliation – worse still was the absolute conviction that any second chance he did request would be granted straight away, no questions asked, because his parents were not mean or callous people and they would always, always forgive him. But he couldn’t ask their forgiveness. He couldn’t admit his stupidity, his mistake in leaving behind everything he knew for some ridiculous adolescent adventure. His mother had been right.

He had no idea what he was doing here.

Daichi sighed and rested his chin against the palm of his hand, one elbow leaning on the round, shiny surface of the table. The street was noisy and busy, with people going about their business here, there, and everywhere, but he barely registered any of the surrounding sights or sounds, wrapped up in his own turbulent thoughts, trapped in a turmoil of self-loathing. What was he _doing?_ Surely he hadn’t left behind his parents, his friends, and a promising sporting career for this – a dead-end job in a foreign country thousands of miles away, the only respite he got being his lunch breaks that he spent at a little pavement café by the river pretending he didn’t hate himself?

He suddenly wondered what on earth he’d been thinking. He couldn’t fathom how he’d been so naïve. He cast his mind back to last September, when he’d first told Kuroo about the idea – it had been shot down rather quickly, of course, but somehow he’d kept coming back to it, and not once, in six months of planning and scrimping and saving, of his parents’ attempts to discourage him, of Kuroo’s attempts to knock some sense into him (sometimes literally), of his teachers’ desperate pleas for him to just consider going to university – not once had he realised how ridiculous he was being. He was going on an adventure, he’d decided, and he was going to discover himself _(ugh)_ and no one could stop him. He’d thrown himself into learning French and had discovered a talent and a passion for languages, which had only fuelled his desire to go. Since injuring himself last autumn and having to sit out most of his final high school matches meant that he hadn’t been scouted by any volleyball coaches (a fact he was still a little bitter about), he’d decided that his only option was to get away from it all, literally. To go to Paris. _Why_ Paris he still wasn’t sure – he’d read it in a novel, probably, and thought it sounded like a romantic place to go. _Romantic,_ he scoffed, snorting at his own stupid naivety. What a joke.

“Is everything alright?”

Daichi almost jumped five feet in the air – he hadn’t been expecting to be approached at all, much less spoken to in perfect Japanese, and he was caught completely off-guard. He turned towards the owner of the soft voice at his elbow and found himself looking into the face of a boy about his age – the most beautiful boy he had probably ever seen, with silvery hair and greenish-brown eyes, dressed in the crisp white shirt and dark waistcoat of a waiter, apron slung around his hips in an oddly fetching manner. He swallowed, returned the boy’s pleasant smile with a rather nervous grin of his own, but when he tried to speak nothing came out. This, Daichi thought, must be the strangest encounter of his life – he could _feel_ his heart racing in his chest, hear the blood pumping in his ears, and he felt as though every nerve in his body were on fire. Something had shifted in him upon seeing the boy, but he had no idea what or why and he could only sit there and gape like a fish – hardly his most charming quality. Trust him to make a fool of himself in front of someone so attractive, without even having to try.

The boy frowned, his cheeks pinking a little with embarrassment. “Ah, my apologies, monsieur,” he said, switching back to French, and something about his sincerity made Daichi want to slam his head against the table and curse himself for being so goddamn awkward. “I just assumed –”

“No, no,” Daichi responded, speaking in Japanese for the first time in what must have been several weeks. “You were right. I’m sorry, I just – I wasn’t expecting you. Er, I mean –”

“I understand,” the boy said, even though he couldn’t possibly because even Daichi himself had no idea what he was trying to say. It hardly mattered, though, because his face lit up with a smile that had Daichi practically melting into the pavement as he added, “I’ve been here almost a year and you’re the first Japanese person I’ve met.” He laughed. “Perhaps I’m not looking in the right places.”

Daichi grinned, feeling an odd warmth flood through him at the boy’s easy manner, his bright eyes and soft voice, his brilliant smile. He introduced himself as Sugawara Koushi and asked Daichi what he was doing in Paris, and when Daichi shrugged and said, “Honestly? I don’t know,” he just looked at him and nodded and smiled a little sadly and said he knew the feeling. And then he said he got off work at six, and would Daichi maybe like to meet him and take a walk down by the river, because it really was ever so pretty at night? And Daichi was so shocked that he almost panicked and declined, but fortunately the part of his brain that actually didn’t screw him over all the time kicked into gear and he said yes, yes, he would love to.

Sugawara met him outside the café at six-thirty, still in his waiter’s uniform (sans apron), and the dazzling grin he gave Daichi when he saw him affected Daichi more than he cared to admit. He felt a smile spread itself slowly across his own face, and silently berated himself for acting like a fifteen year old on his first ever date. _Date,_ he thought with a jolt. Excellent, Daichi, what a choice of wording. _Was_ this a date? Or was it simply a casual evening stroll between friends? Were they even friends? After all, he’d only met Sugawara that afternoon, and though he’d instantly felt strangely comfortable in his presence, they’d really only spoken very briefly, and –

“So, Daichi,” Sugawara said, interrupting his thoughts. “What was it that brought you here in the first place?”

Daichi shrugged. He could feel his cheeks flushing at the thought of telling Sugawara about his ridiculous schoolboy fantasies, romantic notions of European cities, his desperation to escape the shame of not being picked to become a volleyball superstar, his shame at not realising how that desperation led to recklessness. Finally, after much internal debate, he sighed and muttered, “Back home, I wasn’t happy, really. I wanted to get away from everything. I wanted –” he blushed even more deeply – “an adventure. Even though I knew it was stupid, leaving everything behind.”

“It’s not stupid,” Sugawara said quietly. “I think it’s brave.”

Daichi looked up to see Sugawara gazing at him. “Sugawara-san –”

Sugawara laughed. “You can call me Koushi, you know. In case you hadn’t noticed, people use their given names a lot more easily here.”

Daichi grinned nervously and ran a hand through his hair, biting his lower lip as he marvelled at the thought of how intimate it sounded. _Koushi._ He shook his head. “I couldn’t.”

“Suga, then,” the boy replied, smiling at Daichi’s sudden bashfulness. “None of this ‘Sugawara-san’ business. And perhaps I shouldn’t call you Daichi?” he added, seeming suddenly concerned that he was overstepping boundaries.

“No!” Daichi’s response was perhaps a little too quick, a little too enthusiastic, and he cursed his own inability to just be cool. Granted, he hadn’t met a great number of people whom he’d found this utterly captivating, but he couldn’t remember ever having felt so flustered in the presence of another human being. It was like diving into a fast-flowing river or falling through open space – thrilling and terrifying all at once. “I mean – er, you can call me Daichi. I – I like – it sounds nice.”

Suga chuckled again and Daichi blushed. He knew how ridiculous he must sound, and part of him wanted to kick himself but on the other hand, Suga didn’t really seem to mind his getting flustered at absolutely everything. It was strange – there was the constant presence of butterflies in his stomach, and yet being around Suga and keeping up the conversation was the easiest thing ever. As they walked Suga asked all about Daichi’s job at the bakery on the Rue Saint-Dominique (he threw his head back and laughed when Daichi described it as “hot and hellish”); he asked how Daichi was finding France, and whether he was suffering much of a culture shock (Daichi admitted that in the month he’d been here, he’d accidentally put a _-san_ on the end of a customer’s name at least six times); he asked about Daichi’s home life and his hobbies (he was delighted to discover how much they had in common, not least that they had both played volleyball in high school), about his parents’ reaction to his going away, and when Daichi admitted that he hadn’t spoken to them since before he’d left, Suga touched his arm and met his gaze and made him promise to call or at least email them before the week was out. In return Daichi was rewarded with all sorts of facts about Suga – how he’d decided, just like Daichi, that he needed an escape, and how he’d settled on Paris because he’d studied French as a hobby since the age of six (“I must have been the strangest child on the face of the earth,” he mused); how his mother had encouraged him but his father had objected, saying that he needed to go to university or at least get a real job instead of waiting tables in the street; how tense it had been at home before he’d come away and how the first few weeks had been absolutely awful – he’d cried himself to sleep every single night and very nearly broke and booked a plane ticket back home – but after a little while, when he’d got over the shock of being alone and afraid and abroad, he’d started to appreciate the busy streets and the rhythm of the language and the unusual intimacy between strangers. He’d got into the swing of his job, discovered he was actually good at waiting tables, and began to build a rapport with the customers, and before he knew it he was actually enjoying himself. It didn’t hurt, either, that the tower that twinkled every night in the distance looked almost exactly like the one in Tokyo.

“You’re from Tokyo?” Daichi enquired, admiring the way Suga’s eyes shined when he talked about his job or his customers or the way the city looked at night.

Suga shook his head. “I used to go there a lot with my family,” he explained. “I remember the city pretty well. But I’m actually from Miyagi.”

“Miyagi?” Daichi’s eyes were so wide they almost popped out of his head, and in his surprise he was unable to say anything else for a moment. Suga furrowed his brow and stared at him, confused.

“Yes,” he said. “It’s north of Fukushima. About two hours from Tokyo?”

“I know where it is!” Daichi cried, finally regaining his senses. “It’s – _I’m_ from Miyagi.”

The strange coincidence of coming from the same prefecture took them both by surprise, and when they discovered they were even from neighbouring towns Suga could only stare at him with wide eyes, and then he let out a laugh of disbelief and cried, “All the people in the world, and I met you!”

Daichi didn’t get the chance to ask what he meant because then Suga was grabbing his hand and pulling him towards the edge of the path and pointing and whispering, “Look!” And Daichi was met with what he thought must be the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen – the Pont Neuf illuminated, radiant against a backdrop of velvet darkness, starry lights reflected in water that shimmered like molten copper, and beyond, tall and golden and far enough away that he could almost pretend he was in Tokyo – the Eiffel Tower.

And then Suga turned to him, his eyes alight with some unnamed emotion, halfway between anticipation and ecstasy, and Daichi decided that the view of the bridge was only the second most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

“What do you think?” he asked, and Daichi could only nod and smile and privately hope that he wasn’t about to tear up because it had just hit him like a ton of bricks that _dear god_ he’d finally found whatever it was he hadn’t even known he was looking for. He wished he could stop time, could make the seconds and minutes drag on forever so that he’d never have to leave, so that he could stay here, staring out over a bridge with this boy who seemed to have stepped out of a dream, and never have to think about anything but the way his silver hair shone under the street lights, the way his eyes met Daichi’s with a steady, assured expression, the way his mouth quirked up at the corners, the way his hand rested ever so lightly on Daichi’s own, their little fingers loosely linked together. Daichi had never been one to believe in fate, or destiny, or any of that stuff, but for some reason he found himself wondering if this was what it had all been for – maybe this was why he’d been so set on France, maybe this was why he’d refused to listen to his parents or his teachers or Kuroo. Not mere teenage rebelliousness after all, but a real reason, a purpose for coming here and staying even though he’d wanted to leave after the first day. Perhaps this was what it had all been for. Every single moment, every single choice, his whole life, had been leading up to this. Everything, for this.

Was it possible to fall in love with someone after a day? He didn’t have a clue, but he thought that if it was, then he might have managed it without even knowing how. Suga’s words clicked into place, and he couldn’t help echoing them: “All the people in the world, and I met you.”

“Hm?” Suga looked up, pulled from whatever reverie he’d fallen into, and he looked so achingly beautiful that Daichi could only stare and sigh, and when he finally worked up the courage to reach out and touch Suga’s cheek, his heart hammering in his chest, Suga just _looked_ at him with hazel eyes and Daichi almost lost his nerve and pulled away, except that Suga placed his hand on top of his and held it there, and they stayed like that, silent, for what felt like minutes until Suga leaned in and brushed his lips ever so lightly against Daichi’s.

Daichi froze, so caught up in the sensation of Suga’s skin against his skin, Suga’s lips against his own, that he completely forgot he was supposed to reciprocate. Just the light touch of Suga’s mouth on his, the warmth of Suga’s breath in the cold night air, the feeling of being so close to him and yet still not close enough sent shivers down his spine and forced a tiny sigh from his lungs. He wanted to stay like this forever, but suddenly Suga was drawing back and mumbling something that sounded suspiciously apologetic and Daichi had to shake himself out of it and say, “What?”

“I’m sorry,” Suga said, glancing up at him. The expression in his eyes was one of embarrassment and anguish and Daichi didn’t like it. “I misunderstood. I thought you wanted… I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.”

Daichi suddenly realised that Suga had taken his unresponsiveness as a rejection, and he was torn between amusement and mortification – he couldn’t believe that he’d managed to mess up something as simple as a kiss. It wasn’t even like it was his first kiss, although he had to admit it was the first one that had made him feel something like lightning shooting through him – even so, he’d somehow managed to send all the wrong signals and make Suga think he hadn’t wanted it, which was entirely the opposite of what he’d meant to do. He laughed nervously and ran a hand through his hair.

“You don’t have to stop,” he murmured, wishing he could be a little smoother when it came to things like this. “It’s not that I – well, I _did_ want to, um, kiss you, and, well –” He sighed, cringing at his own ineptitude – “I just got so caught up that I kind of, um, forgot to kiss you back.”

There was a pause, and he thought, _oh fuck_ – he’d really messed up now – but then Suga laughed and swatted him lightly and said, “Sawamura Daichi, how are you even real?”

Daichi could only grin and lean in and kiss him, properly this time. He closed his eyes and felt the softness of Suga’s lips, the huff of surprise that escaped them, the fluttering of Suga’s lashes against his own, Suga’s hand on his cheek and his fingers in Daichi’s hair and the sharpness of his hipbone against Daichi’s thumb and the curve of his waist against Daichi’s palm and the way this moment was indisputably the most perfect moment of Daichi’s life so far. 

Suga broke away and pulled him close, burying his face in the crook of Daichi’s neck like it was made to rest there, his arms around Daichi’s neck and his chest pressed against Daichi’s, and Daichi could feel his heartbeat, steady and sure and warm and soft and _home._ And even though he knew it was absurd to fall in love in a single day, even though it was surely impossible to want to spend the rest of your life with someone you barely knew, he couldn’t stop thinking of that word – _home._

Something occurred to him as he pressed little kisses into Suga’s neck and he muttered, “Hey. I spend two hours in that café every day, how come I’ve never seen you before?”

“I usually work breakfast and dinner,” Suga told him. “But I was finishing my morning shift last week and I saw you, and…” He trailed off, suddenly shy.

“And?” Daichi prompted, grinning.

“And I was… intrigued, so I asked my boss if I could switch to lunchtimes instead.” 

Daichi laughed. “Why didn’t you just come over?”

“Without an excuse?” Suga replied, sounding mildly horrified. “I couldn’t have, I was far too shy. I’ve been working up the courage for a week.”

“Not that shy.” Daichi couldn’t help teasing him a little. “Not too shy to ask me on a date.”

“It didn’t have to be a date if you didn’t want it to.”

He brushed his fingers lightly over Suga’s ribcage, eliciting a soft sigh. “I really did want it to.”

Suga chuckled. “That’s good,” he murmured. “So did I.” 

“You know, I was starting to wonder why I even came to Paris,” Daichi confessed, pulling away to look Suga in the eye and brushing stray hairs from his forehead. “I mean, _Paris,_ of all places. I couldn’t have come further from home if I’d tried. But now I’m thinking, maybe there was a reason after all, and I just didn’t know it till now.”

Suga smiled, that brilliant, beautiful, honest smile, and Daichi’s stomach flipped. It was bizarre, really, when he thought about it – Suga was practically a stranger still, and yet Daichi felt safer here, alone with him, than he had in a month of wandering through busy Parisian streets in broad daylight. Suga could be anybody, and yet he couldn’t be just anybody, because he was _Suga,_ and he was already so special, more special than he probably knew. More special than anyone Daichi had ever encountered in his life.

“Do you think,” Suga said idly, gazing out across the river, “that if we’d stayed at home, we would have lived our whole lives without knowing each other?”

The idea seemed both ridiculous and plausible at the same time – after all, they lived so close to one another, and yet in eighteen years they’d never once met; he’d spent his whole life ignorant of this astonishing boy – yet already he couldn’t imagine a world without Suga in it.

“That’s impossible.” He shook his head, unwilling to believe such a concept. “I’d have found you eventually.”

Suga smiled, and a warmth flooded through Daichi that he wasn’t sure he’d ever felt before, and he thought, _home._

***

“So what’s been the worst thing?” Suga asked one day in mid-April, as they sprawled on a picnic rug in the park, Daichi’s head resting in his lap. He combed his fingers through Daichi’s soft hair, a smile still playing on his lips from the previous question (the best thing about Paris) and Daichi’s answer (meeting him, obviously). 

Daichi sighed and considered for a moment, eyes closed and lips slightly parted, and then he muttered, without a hint of irony, “Definitely the cutlery.”

Suga couldn’t help but laugh at that. “I didn’t realise you missed chopsticks so much.”

“I have twelve pairs, Koushi. _Twelve._ Ornamental ones, even. My parents keep sending them over.”

“How are your parents?” Suga asked tentatively. Daichi spoke more casually about them these days, but they didn’t come up in conversation all that often, and Suga got the impression that the relationship was still a little strained. 

Daichi bit his lip. “They want to meet you. Kuroo too.”

Suga nodded slowly and gazed up at cotton wool clouds, soft against the azure sky. It was warm for the time of year; something about the weather and the long days made Suga think of youth and summer romance – though he sincerely hoped his relationship with Daichi would last throughout every summer and winter for the rest of his days.

“How do you feel about that?”

Daichi’s eyes flew open, and he stared up at Suga, a frown etched on his face. This was typical of him, putting everyone else above himself even when he really ought to be the priority. He had the sweetest temperament of anyone Daichi had ever met, but sometimes he could be a little too generous for his own good. Daichi sighed. “Shouldn’t I be the one asking you that?” he said.

Suga smiled indulgently and leaned down to kiss his forehead. “I’d love to meet them, Daichi,” he said. “But they’re your parents. It’s your decision.”

“They’d hate it here,” Daichi murmured, closing his eyes again. “My mother still can’t get her head around the idea of shops closing for lunch. She reckons it’ll make me lazy. I tell her that’s just the way they do things here, but she thinks it’s mad.”

Suga chuckled. “It means I get to see you for an extra two hours every day, so I don’t mind.” 

Daichi smiled, fingers plucking idly at a blade of grass, and he pictured the greenery around him, the shrubs and trees that were so different from the ones he was used to. “It’s cherry blossom season,” he said quietly.

“Mm.”

“This is the first year I’ve missed it.”

“We can go home anytime you like, you know,” Suga said, and his voice was soft as ever but there was an underlying firmness to his tone – a promise of, _wherever you go, I’ll follow._ “It’s not as though we’ll be far away from each other.”

“Never.”

“Just say, Daichi,” Suga murmured. “Anything you want from me, just say it. If you want to go home –”

“Koushi,” he muttered, his fingers finding Suga’s, lacing them together – a promise. _Wherever you go, I’ll follow._ “I’m not going anywhere.” How could he? Already he couldn’t imagine straying from his side, going back to being cold and alone and estranged. He’d been so lost, and Suga had found him, and all the cherry blossoms in the world couldn’t compensate for that. “I’m already home.”

**Author's Note:**

> p.s. it sounds silly but i haven't written in past tense for absolutely ages and i kept slipping into present tense while i was writing D: so apologies if there are any mistakes!!


End file.
